


Human (I wish I was)

by Hopeful_Foolx



Series: Whumptober 2020 [3]
Category: Star Trek: Picard
Genre: Alternative Prompt 3: Comfort, Angst, Discussions of Identity, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, One hug, Whumptober 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2020-10-02
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:20:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26781298
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hopeful_Foolx/pseuds/Hopeful_Foolx
Summary: What is human? An ability to reason, to imagine? To love or grief? If so, we are more human than any of them will ever be. (Sense8, ep.10) The question remains. Because why exactly should Hugh not see himself as a monster, if that is what they say he is?-Whumptober day 3, alternative prompt 3: Comfort.
Relationships: Elnor & Hugh | Third of Five, Elnor/Hugh | Third of Five
Series: Whumptober 2020 [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1945483
Comments: 2
Kudos: 15
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	Human (I wish I was)

**Author's Note:**

> Hi, it's me. This was originally a missing scene I finally cleaned up. Pairing can be read as platonic. Have fun ^^

Sometimes it calms him to look at his reflection. He looks different than before, without all the technology, almost human, so close to it, and he remembers the moment he first saw his own face so vividly. Years ago, now. A stranger in the mirror, it’s not like he looked at his own reflection a lot before, mirrors were irrelevant for Borg. But he definitely saw himself occasionally. Before the process that removed most, or at least most of the visible parts, he sometimes looked at his reflection and asked himself, if he was a monster. He did research them at some point, after being called one, of course he did. The word. The meanings. So many kinds in all cultures, but with a few crossover points. Distorted, not-human, without feelings. Different is another word. Figures who snatch children from their beds and make them their own, hurt them, kill them, worse. He researched ancient religions on five different planets and it all comes down to the same. Creatures who show no mercy, murder without shame. Butcher without regret - of course, easy, without feelings. The more he read about them, the more he found the similarities. Even after the process, when he found peace in the face that stared back at him after a particularly bad nightmare, he still couldn’t get it out of his head. Just because he stopped looking like it - does it make him less one of them? Does it make anything better? Or, even worse, because now he doesn’t look like a monster anymore, while he still is the same person. He talked about it with Geodi one time. The conclusion was that Geordi wouldn’t let him think that, even though it was actually a more rational thought than the fear he is one. He only actually accepted it when he realized that it would make the other xBs monsters too, and they are not different from him. Everyone was so keen on telling him he was not that nobody really discussed the topic. Everyone was two people but still. He only then noticed the core of the stories, the fairy tales talking about gruesome monsters, they were all told by the people who killed them - as an excuse for doing so. It’s how they were seen, there is a high chance that there are no monsters, and everything called by this name is just seen as one. But it’s never that easy. And the same goes for the xBs. It’s not that they are monsters, they are seen as such by some people, what Picard said hadn’t been wrong - they are victims. Just that he refuses and will forever, to see himself as one. They are. He is not, because he had been the first. The other part he could live with far better - even if he had been, even if he were a monster now, he is making up for it. Or he tries. It’s not wrong what Elnor once said, that he sees every problem as his to fix. But it’s for a number of reasons, the biggest one being how he tries to make everyone better and maybe even happy, making up for what he probably did as Borg to every person he can. He doesn’t remember all of it. It’s the worst about it, he doesn’t even remember except for his dreams. But kindness is shown in actions, and he acts, whatever it takes. He’s failed before, far too often, he failed when he returned to the collective, being responsible for the deaths of them on the ship, and later, when he trusted Lore far too easily. Now again. He tries to make up for it so they count, he has them in his mind, always, every single one of them, every single one of them he failed. And then there is Elnor, who doesn’t know. He can’t know who Hugh really is, what he has done, how much blood he actually has on his hands. It just… doesn’t work the same way with him. He seems to know, Hugh told him, he saw what happened on the Artifact and adding to that, he is also fairly sure he has asked Picard about him by now. He just doesn’t care. It feels like he knows what happened and by some reason Hugh fails to understand, he doesn’t see it as Hugh’s fault. And his usual trick, Hugh’s attitude of distracting others away from himself to make them care about more important things, it doesn’t  _ work _ . He does appreciates gestures, but they never distract him from what he wants to know, from what he asked. It’s like he knows exactly what Hugh is trying to do and lets him believe he succeeded, to shatter that belief a moment later.

“Hugh? Are you alright?” He nearly jumps when he hears him call, there is a saying, speaking of the devil? Another monster. 

“Don’t worry” he answers back, still staring at the mirror. It’s not as fogged up as it was a few minutes ago, and he looks at himself in it. His face. His wet hair. The clothes that are his and still not really, because they actually belong to the ship if he thinks about it. They are plain, he doesn’t have any preferences, what does that say about him? Because it feels like it makes him less-real. But it’s him. With the scar along his face and the implants, the same implants that were merged to his skull long ago, the same implants that saved his life. His mismatched eyes, and how it’s so visible that one of them is robotic because he is pale, not as pale as Borg, better now, but still. He is used to it, there is no sunlight on a Cube. It’s just different, because he looks exhausted, he sees the shadows in his face, and feels tired. So tired, he’s slept for most of the day and now he just wants to fall over and continue. He doubts he can, though. He knows that they will be back in his dreams, and he can’t muster up any resistance against them. Maybe it helps that he is not alone, and there is also no way he won’t sleep. Rationally, he knows he needs to. He insisted on finally showering and frankly, he needed some time by himself, without Elnor hovering close to him. He is not dying - not anymore, at least. Now he is shaking a little too much, and since it’s warm, of course he is dizzy. It’s normal. He is still tired, and he should go back to their room, just that he also can’t resist all the thoughts coming back now when he looks up to the mirror again, distorted by the moisture features, and his own face - it’s not just his own face in the mirror suddenly, and he gasps, spins around too fast, reaching out to grab Elnor’s arm to not stumble - his Romulan-Ninja-tactics are probably useful in a lot of situations, now is not one of them. But Elnor looks completely unfazed when he lets him go, as if he didn’t nearly made his heart stop, as if he didn’t just appear out of nowhere. As if he didn’t just get him out of his mind.

“You didn’t answer, I needed to know nothing happened” He looks up to the mirror and back to Hugh, curiosity growing in his face, the fact that he nearly gave Hugh a heart attack a moment before seemingly forgotten, and really, can he blame him? He can’t. With how he saved his life, now cares, he can’t be mad at him, he couldn’t even if he tried. Why would he try?

“What were you doing, just looking in the mirror?” 

“Nothing, it’s stupid, really, and not important-” Elnor shakes his head.

“That is not true, you just … stared at it. So there has to be something” He steps closer, as if looking at the mirror himself would give him answers. There is something so easy about talking to Elnor, he doesn’t feel bad for telling him the truth and maybe right now is one of these situations. He’ll say what he really thinks - not what he thinks Hugh wants to hear. 

“Sometimes I… Sometimes I look at it and… It’s good to see me, not… Not a Borg in there. And then there are other times, like now when…” He swallows pats the metal above his eye, “I just wish I could rip them off. No matter the consequences” It’s the shortest version of the problem but doesn’t explain it.

“But they belong to you?”

“Yes, they do. Like… my name, but…” It’s not that simple. Thoughts to words, it’s really impressive how Elnor is able to.

“Then why would you do that?”   
  
“Because… I sometimes…” he stops and closes his eyes, “I look like a monster, Elnor. A lot of people still see me as one, and they will never stop. They will always only see  _ the monster I once was _ , and not only with me, they will look at the xBs and judge. They won’t give us a chance, because in their eyes, we are just that, monsters” 

“But you are not a monster” It’s so confused and honest that Hugh actually meets his gaze.   
  
“I was, and sometimes, I am not sure if I ever stopped being one” Elnor puts a hand on his arm and suddenly looks at him as if he were talking to a child. 

“You have clearly no idea what a monster is. As far as I can see, you are not breathing fire, don’t swallow entire planets, you don’t drink blood for every meal…” the list goes on, but Hugh stops listening - not because he is not interested, on the contrary, Romulan monsters sound interesting. What stuns him is how easy it seems for Elnor. He says it like he is the only judge on the matter, the only monsters he knows are the only ones that exist, and it’s naive, somehow, in a beautiful way. He doesn’t even pay mind to how Hugh could be one, he just finds all the reasons he is not, but it’s what everyone does. 

“There is… there is more to being a monster, Elnor-” he tries to interrupt him in between anyway, because he actually had a point. Elnor isn’t seeing it, but it feels like he is doing it on purpose now.

“Oh, there is,” he admits and just shrugs, “It comes down to liking to do terrible things and not regretting them” He turns to Hugh, maybe it’s the moisture in the room but he looks concerned when he continues, “But when you walked into the bathroom door yesterday morning, you apologized to it, so I have to admit that I am more confused as how you see yourself as a monster than convinced you are one” 

There is only silence following his words. 

Hugh has a thousand words on his mind, he wants to say a million things that all contain three words that taste like sugar and are hard to hold back, but he can’t say them. He’s caught between laughing and feeling embarrassed, but that doesn’t matter because Elnor managed to stun him completely. 

“I am… I didn’t realize you were awake for that” He says, just to say something, anything, it’s a weak excuse. He needs to get out of this bathroom, it’s too small, too warm, that is the only reason he feels lightheaded. Of course it is. No other reason. No other indeed. 

“I… I think I’ll… go to…” he points in the general direction of the open door, it’s cooler in there as it is in here. Cooler is better, he swallows hard “I think I’ll lie down again?” How did he do that? How does Elnor always manage that? Nobody, he never let anyone this close so fast, he wouldn’t, but it’s so easy to let Elnor in, to tell him, to talk to him. It’s all so easy to tell him his doubts and fears, and… 

He puts a hand against the wall when the dizziness washes over him with more force than before.  _ It’s fine. It’s all fine _

“Are you alright?” Elnor sounds like he is far away, while Hugh knows he is close. He can’t just let him see him cry, not over this. Because his questioning self is already too much to bear, he can’t just make it worse.

“Fine, just… dizzy” he mumbles and closes his eyes for a moment, when everything seems to move again. Ah. Yes, that too. And there it is again, the hand on his arm, then on his other arm, and he blinks at Elnor who just shakes his head and wraps his arms around him, as if a hug was the solution to everything, as if a hug was what could fix the world and all problems and keep him alive. Then again - maybe it could. At least right now.

“A monster would not see himself as a monster” Elnor mumbles, “It wouldn’t ask himself. Not worry so much” There is a pause and a slight chuckle, “So if you are wrong, I don’t want to be right”

  
  
  



End file.
